I took a short trip to T.O with my partner RZ to revisit the peeps I know, get to know the streets again and meet some new peeps. Here is a recap of Day One:

Firsts:

On the first day, to get us all the places we needed to go, we rented bikes from Curbside Cycle. I had the chance to chat about bike philosophy and fashion with Eric and Mike and also ran into a friend from YYC, Laura Leif, one of the founders of Local Library, an all-ages music and Community Arts venue in Calgary. She's been transplanted in T.O for the last couple years --- and it was her first day working at Curbside! What a coincidence! It also happened to be the first day that Lilly's Lunches was on the job. So awesome! All the best Lilly's Lunches!

On a sidenote and segway, I also met with Heather from Dandyhorse Magazine (on Day Two), a great local magazine about bike culture in T.O. Here is a great article on Lillys Lunches that Dandyhorse wrote.

Right after securing the bike at Curbside, I headed down to Darkhorse Espresso on Spadina to have lunch with  Kathleen from Urbane Cyclist, amongst other seriously insightful and  inspiring convo, Kathleen told me about the Cupcake ride that happens monthly. I hope I can make one the next time I'm there! 

Later in the day, I met up with my best friend, Jerisse and headed over to Bike Pirates, one of the Community Bike shops on the Westend of downtown T.O, to fix her brakes for Spring riding.

Shout out to Dylan, for helping Jerisse and I get the job sorted! Shout out also to the guy in the pirate hat and friends for the wonderful soup and convo in the kitchen.

With brakes fixed and ready to ride, we headed to the AGM for the Toronto Cyclists Union to see what's up and happening in the move forward for bikes on streets for T.O. We were invited to the Bike Union meeting through Alexander of 416CycleStyle  and met up with him there. Alex also started a neighbourhood community bikeshare in his neighbourhood of Markland Woods, Etobicoke, a suburb of Toronto - so inspiring. He also recently wrote an awesome account of the our night out with him, 'YYC to YYZ' with photos to match. We look forward to chilling again, Alex ~ thanks for your serious radness.

At the meeting, we heard some similar stories to the motions happening in Calgary, the struggles, the triumphs, ideas, hope and energy - Thanks so much for inviting us to join in and hear about it all, Bike Union peeps <3

The night ended with drinks and delicious eats at Watusi and a ride west to home for a short night's sleep before Day Two.

Stay tuned <3